July 2026
Jobs Report

Tech job postings increased 3% month-over-month in June, consistent with the sustained expansion that has held for most of 2026. Year-over-year, postings are up 27% compared to June 2025, extending the acceleration seen in May and reinforcing that the market has moved from recovery into a period of steady growth.

AI skill requirements reached 75% of U.S. tech job postings in June, up from 73% in May. Year-over-year, that figure is up 178% from June 2025. AI fluency now sits at the center of most tech hiring rather than at its margins.

Regional hiring patterns show continued recovery

More than half of the top 10 states posted month-over-month gains in June, led by Maryland (+20%), North Carolina (+8%), Florida (+7%), and Texas (+7%); New York, Virginia, Illinois, and New Jersey also grew modestly. California (-1%) and Massachusetts (-8%) were the only declines. All 10 states still grew year-over-year, led by New Jersey (+64%) and Maryland (+47%).

Maryland’s gain tracks with its place in the Baltimore-Washington corridor, where federal agencies and defense contractors drive steady cybersecurity hiring. That shows up at the metro level too: Baltimore (+24%) led all top metros month-over-month, followed by Washington, D.C. (+10%), Atlanta (+9%), and Dallas (+6%), while San Jose (-4%) and Boston (-7%) declined. Year-over-year, all 10 metros grew, led by New York (+47%) and a three-way tie between Chicago, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C. (+46%).

Job titles posting month-over-month growth above 150% in June cluster into three groups: enterprise systems and consulting (Appian Developers, Oracle Cloud Financials Consultants, ServiceNow Managers, Principal Consultants, Technology Consultants), core engineering and infrastructure (IT Software Engineers, C++ Software Developers, Configuration Analysts, Support Engineers, Network Infrastructure Engineers, Substation Electrical Engineers), and AI and security (Artificial Intelligence Analysts, Cyber Threat Intelligence Analysts).

Month-over-month skills growth

The fastest-growing skills in June were Electronic Engineering (69%), API System Integration (58%), LDAP (55%), Digital Forensics (54%), Data Exchange (53%), Enterprise Integration (50%), Threat Detection (48%), NIST Cybersecurity Framework (47%), and SAML (45%).

Two threads run through this list: integration (API System Integration, Data Exchange, Enterprise Integration), reflecting the ongoing work of connecting AI systems to enterprise data and workflows — widely cited as the main bottleneck between AI pilots and production — and identity/governance (LDAP, SAML, NIST CSF, Threat Detection, Digital Forensics), reflecting a security posture that treats AI agents as identities needing authentication and monitoring alongside traditional users. Electronic Engineering’s growth is harder to tie to the AI theme and more likely reflects the manufacturing and hardware investment noted above.

Year-over-year skills growth (250%+)

Skills growing 250% or more year-over-year include Enterprise Integration (638%), Agentic AI (587%), AI Agents (503%), Responsible AI (495%), AI Infrastructure (366%), Vector Database (353%), Event-Driven Programming (310%), Product Family Engineering (287%), Database Software (285%), RAG (275%), Tooling (253%), Prompt Engineering (253%), and Observability (251%).

Enterprise Integration’s lead, ahead of Agentic AI itself, reinforces the same bottleneck seen in the monthly data: connecting agentic systems to existing infrastructure is growing faster than the agentic systems themselves. Agentic AI, AI Agents, Responsible AI, AI Infrastructure, Vector Database, RAG, and Prompt Engineering form a familiar cluster tracking the shift from assistive AI to systems that complete multi-step tasks with limited oversight, while Event-Driven Programming and Observability reflect the real-time monitoring that continuously running agents require. Database Software and Tooling likely reflect the same infrastructure build-out; Product Family Engineering doesn’t have a clear tie to the broader AI themes.